Ag Export - Import Numbers

New numbers released by U.S. economists show troubling but not surprising impacts of the trade war. Ag exports were valued at $11.2 billion in April, while ag imports rose to a record-high $12.1 billion. That created a U.S. ag trade deficit of more than $865 million for the month. That's only the fourth monthly deficit in more than a decade.

Kamron Daugherty, USDA trade economist, gives the overall agricultural export and import numbers for the first seven months of FY2019.

"For fiscal year 2019 we have exports at 81.2 billion dollars, down 6.5 percent from fiscal year 2018. We have imports at 77.3 billion dollars up 2.6 percent and we have a trade balance of 3.9 billion dollars down 65 percent from fiscal year 2018."

Here are some of the specific export value numbers for the first seven months of fiscal year 2019. Wheat at 3.6 billion dollars, up 27 percent, corn 6 billion dollars, 15 percent higher, soybeans 10.6 billion dollars, down 32 percent from the previous year and cotton 3.5 billion dollars, down 16 percent from 2018.

Overall, the USDA report cut expected FY19 U.S. ag exports to $137 billion, down about $4.5 billion from the February forecast. The FY19 U.S. ag trade surplus, forecasted at $8 billion in May, was cut by $5.5 billion from February

USDA economists say they expect an 8 billion dollars trade balance compared to 11.5 billion in 2018.